


Last Man Standing

by jmtorres



Category: Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
Genre: First Time, M/M, Yuletide 2004
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-25
Updated: 2004-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-11 20:35:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/116821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jmtorres/pseuds/jmtorres
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ford, unlike Arthur, is desperately clinging to his cool.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Last Man Standing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lady Zip](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Lady+Zip).



_Hitchhiker's Weekly,_ a periodical published over Sub-Ethanet whenever _Guide_ writers had produced a sufficient volume of addenda and (primarily) errata, once threw in the following reader poll as filler:

_If life as you know it was about to end on your planet, and you could escape with one other person, who would you take with you?_

Reader response favored celebrities first. Then more practical readers chose famed space survivalists such as President of the Imperial Galactic Government Zaphod Beeblebrox, who is rumored to have survived over six minutes in the vacuum of space by giving himself mouth-to-mouth. A small but significant portion of readers named their spouses or lovers (until informed that the poll was anonymous, at which point most of them, even the women, changed their votes to Eccentrica Gallumbits, the triple-breasted whore of Eroticon Six).

Ford Prefect (then working a brief and boring stint as an intern at the _Guide_ , trying to save up enough money to buy a copy and put it to good use) had collated this data to be published in the next issue of _Hitchhiker's Weekly._ His neatly color-coded pie chart had been dropped in favor of a rather important retraction ("Do _not_ eat the deliciously fluffy lavender crab cakes in cream sauce served on Madsa XIV; they will give you the runs"), but the question remained with him.

Of course, it was not particularly applicable in his current circumstances. For one thing, Ford couldn't take _anybody,_ just anybody he could find and convince to trust him within the next twelve minutes. Most celebrities were out of range, even if Ford had decided, in the many years he had had to ponder the question, that he would choose a celebrity to escape with.

Ford had decided just the opposite--that celebrities would be far too much trouble to be worth it. Celebrities had a certain intolerable arrogance to them. Perhaps the perfect example of this was Zaphod Beeblebrox, who was, at this particular moment, preparing to pull an intolerably arrogant stunt on the other side of the galaxy. After all, it takes a fair portion of intolerable arrogance to announce to the press that you'd like to steal a thing mere moments before you actually steal it.

Ford could not possibly have known this, having been out of touch with Zaphod since getting stranded on Earth, but he knew enough about Zaphod to know that he wouldn't choose Zaphod to escape with, either. Zaphod wasn't a survivalist, just an amazingly lucky guy. He took excessive risks, and someday, his one of his stunts was going to get him killed. Right after his luck ran out.

Ford could not possibly know the boost Zaphod's already highly improbable luck was about to receive.

Ford did, however, know that the story about Zaphod surviving six minutes in the vacuum of space was, if not entirely apocryphal, then at least terribly exaggerated.

As for Eccentrica Gallumbits, Ford had heard she had contracted Andovian Space Herpes. Sentimentality beat out STDs every day of the week.

Another reason _Hitchhiker's Weekly_ 's poll was inapplicable in Ford's current circumstances was that it was not _Ford's_ planet that was about to be destroyed by the Vogons in order to build a hyperspatial express route.

Life as one knew it on Ford's home planet of Betelgeuse Seven had ended many years before.

Sometime in between tumbling through the vacuum of space, wondering if giving Arthur mouth-to-mouth would do anything besides freeze their tongues together, and learning of Zaphod's search for Magrathea, Ford sat Arthur down and tried to explain this to him. However, he did this without telling Arthur anything about the destruction of Betelgeuse Seven whatsoever, as he, like most people, didn't know what had happened or how it had happened or even why it had happened. As a result, the conversation was very awkward and, from Arthur's perspective, entirely insincere. "I know how you feel" is one of those empty phrases people from Earth used all the time without meaning a word of it.

"How can you know how I feel?!" Arthur demanded. "My whole bloody planet is completely gone!"

"Yes," said Ford. "I know."

Ford meant this perfectly sincerely and thought Arthur should have been able to figure out about Ford's planet being gone too without him having to say it. He was getting rather irked with Arthur for not having figured it out, thinking Arthur selfishly obsessed with his own planet's destruction.

"If you're going to be such an unsympathetic git about it," said Arthur, "why did you even save me?"

"Because I couldn't get to Cher in twelve minutes, and I doubt she'd have believed me anyway," said Ford.

Arthur stared at him as if he'd grown another head. As this affliction had been known to occur in some members of Ford's family, he surreptitiously checked to make sure he still had just the one by non-chalantly scratching his neck.

"Ford," said Arthur, "I _didn't_ believe you." He had apparently decided to ignore the bit about Cher, which was quite reasonable, as it made no sense out of context. "You just got me drunk and dragged me along."

"Er," said Ford. He tried again. "Because you're not intolerably arrogant?"

Unlike some people, who had been to Earth six months ago and run off with some chippie Arthur fancied instead of rescuing Ford, who had been stranded for fifteen years.

"Thank you," said Arthur. "I think. That was a rather back-handed compliment. So, it was my winning personality that led you to decide to save me from the destruction of my planet?"

Ford didn't find Arthur's personality terribly winning, but he didn't want to insult him by saying so outright, so he offered another reason. "Because you don't have Andovian Space Herpes." He was pretty sure this was the case, as there was no one on Earth Arthur could have caught it from. "Or any other STDs." Ford had only rarely observed Arthur to have dates, and most of these ended poorly. It stood to reason that he didn't have any sexually transmitted diseases because he hadn't been having any sex.

"Why on Earth," Arthur began. He paused. "Or anywhere else," he amended, "would it matter if I had any STDs?"

Ford thought this was perfectly obvious. "Well, it means we don't have to use condoms."

Arthur's mouth dropped open, and his face began to redden. "If you saved me from the destruction of my planet to make me some kind of sex slave, you can just--oh--I--" he said, turning purple.

This seemed to be a malformed question, so Ford did his best to answer it. "I'm not actually into the dominance/submission scene, but I suppose I can try it if you really want to," he offered earnestly.

Arthur made a strangled noise before managing to say, "No. No, I'd rather not."

The real reason Ford had chosen to save Arthur, of all his acquaintances on Earth, was that Arthur had not laughed.

The particular occasion on which Arthur had not laughed was the one when Ford had rather unfortunately told a police officer that he was looking for green flying saucers, and the officer had taken him in for public inebriation. Ford had rung up Arthur and Arthur had come and got him and let him bunk on his couch for the night, and given him tea the following morning without clattering around too much and making Ford's headache worse.

If Ford had told Arthur any of this, Arthur's response would have been, "Well, of course I didn't laugh! It bloody well wasn't funny, being rung up at three o'clock in the morning to come fetch you from the police station!" to which Ford would have replied, "Everyone else seemed to think it was, especially the bit about the flying saucers."

However, Ford did not tell Arthur any of this because he was heavily invested in keeping his cool in exactly the opposite of the manner in which Arthur had decided the destruction of his planet gave him license not to.

Ford did ponder the anecdote, though. In retrospect, it was, if not gut-bustingly funny, then at least a little ironic. He realized that it was entirely possible that Arthur had not laughed because he was completely lacking a sense of humor, something which Ford had always assumed to be indispensible in a lover, along with such traits as good looks, personality, a sparkling wit, and various other features Arthur was not a shining example of.

But that didn't matter, because on that single occasion when Ford had lost enough of his cool to care whether anyone laughed at him or not, Arthur had refrained.

Ford leaned across the table and kissed Arthur.

Arthur, who had been bemusedly watching Ford ponder and eye him critically for a few minutes, yelped.

Ford drew back in astonishment. He was not completely unskilled as a lover, and quite often elicited screams of "Oh God!" and such, but usually later in the proceedings. All one could realistically expect in terms of vocal encouragement at this point were moans and heated whispers, so Arthur's yelp was quite startling.

"What do you think you're doing?" Arthur demanded.

Ford realized he had misjudged Arthur's reaction. "Really," he said disgustedly. "Most people get turned on by danger, and have you any idea how much danger we've been in over the past few hours?"

"I thought we'd just established that I don't want to be your sex slave," Arthur said.

Ford was confused. Or possibly Arthur was confused. Hadn't Ford also established that he wasn't interested in being Arthur's master? "I thought we'd leave the handcuffs at home and try something on a more equal footing," Ford suggested.

"Like what?" Arthur asked suspiciously.

"Like," Ford said. He contemplated various sexual permutations. If Arthur was really bothered by the slave thing (which he seemed to be, even though he'd suggested it in first place), then he probably wouldn't appreciate anything with the slightest hint of topping or bottoming. "I don't know. Handjobs?"

"Ford," Arthur said plaintively, "I don't understand."

"You know," said Ford. "Stroking each other off?"

"No," said Arthur. "I don't understand why you want to--to--to."

Ford contemplated this for a moment. Was it possible that human beings continually stated what seemed perfectly obvious to him because they were mentally stunted and for the most part didn't see the perfectly obvious at all, and shared whatever insights they had with each other in an effort to be helpful?

Working from this new theory, Ford tried to lay it out as simply as he could. "I fancy you. I want to have sex with you."

"You fancy me," Arthur repeated.

The first bit had sunk in, at least. "And I want to have sex with you," Ford said helpfully. "People often do, when they fancy each other."

Arthur looked even more bewildered. "Why do you fancy me?" he asked.

This was a question Ford could not hope to answer truthfully without exposing his vulnerabilities in a completely uncool way, which is why he had not explained it to Arthur in the first place. Therefore, he lied. "You're really quite likeable," he said cheerfully.

"I am?" Arthur asked.

"Yes," Ford said. "You've got a great sense of humor and you're quite good-looking. You've got a wonderful personality and a sparkling wit."

"Do you really think so?" Arthur asked, looking a good deal more open.

Ford crossed his fingers behind his back. "Yes," he said.

"Oh," said Arthur. He was smiling slightly. To Ford's surprise, Arthur was actually a little good-looking, in a goofy way, when he smiled.

Ford took Arthur's hand. "Come on," he said. "Let's see if the bunks on this ship are big enough for two."

And then they had sex.

Afterwards, basking in physical intimacy, Ford had a moment of unprecedented desire for emotional intimacy. It was this which led him to say, "Look, the thing I was trying to tell you earlier, that went straight over your head--" Arthur frowned at him. "--was, well, do you know what a Hrung is?"

"No," Arthur said shortly.

Ford sighed. It had been a long shot, but he really did hope to one day meet the man who could illuminate the matter for him. "Neither do I," he confessed. "But one collapsed on my planet."

"Your--" Arthur's frown deepened. "Ford," he said very slowly and somewhat suspiciously, "what happened to your planet?"

"Everybody died," said Ford. He found himself struggling between wanting Arthur to know how this really affected him and acting as if he didn't care at all. "My father was the only survivor."

"Isn't Zaphod your cousin or something?" Arthur asked.

"Yeah," Ford said. "My father married Zaphod's--" He paused. This explanation was complicated by both the normal mode of reproduction on Betelgeuse Five, which wasn't nearly as simple and binary as it was on Earth (but which is generally regarded as much more enjoyable by people who like orgies), and by the fact that Zaphod had mucked things up further by siring at least one of his ancestors via time travel. "My father married into Zaphod's family," Ford said.

"So he's not--I mean--he _does_ rather look as if he's a different species," Arthur said, pondering. Then he looked at Ford intently. "Does this sort of thing happen often?"

"Interspecies marriage? All the time," Ford said breezily.

"Planets blowing up," said Arthur. "Or having Hrungs collapse on them. Or being otherwise destroyed. _That_ sort of thing."

It was exceedingly rare. It had been a huge coincidence that Ford's immediate family had been involved in two such instances, and Ford was somewhat emotionally scarred. If he let himself think about it at all, he began to fear that he had somehow been cursed with abysmally bad luck, and that disaster might dog his footsteps all his days.

"Yes," said Ford, unblinking. Of course, he had no biological need to blink. "Calamity is universal."

"Bugger," said Arthur. "I was rather afraid you'd say that."

~fin


End file.
